SORRY LIBERALS! Obama Isn't Going To Start Talking About Gun Control Now

In the wake of
last Friday's horrifying massacre in Aurora, Colo., a tenuous
agreement to avoid "politicizing" the tragedy has given way to
the predictable shouting match between powerful guns rights
advocates and their gun control adversaries, who see
a rare opportunity to rehash the debate about the country's lax
gun laws.

But if the liberal gun control lobby was hoping that the
events in Aurora would help them win over allies in the White
House, they can stop holding their breath.

Speaking to reporters on Air Force One last night, White
House Press Secretary Jay Carney and Obama campaign
press secretary Jen Psaki made it clear that President
Barack Obama will not push Congress to take up the
Federal Assault Weapons Ban again.

Here are the relevant excerpts from the White House transcript
(emphasis mine):

MR. CARNEY:...He [the President] believes we need to
take steps that protect Second Amendment rights of the American
people but that ensure that we are not allowing weapons into the
hands of individuals who should not, by existing law, obtain
those weapons. And there are a number of steps that have
been taken and a number of others that can be taken to accomplish
that goal.

I don't have any — the Department of Justice can provide more
details in terms of some of the steps that we've taken involving
making higher quantity and quality of information available in
background checks, and other measures they've taken which I know
they can provide to you, working with law enforcement agencies.
But the President's view is that we can take steps to
keep guns out of the hands of people who should not have them
under existing law. And that's his focus right now.

QUESTION: In terms of like assault weapons or
something like that, there's no renewed push for a renewed
assault weapons ban?

MR. CARNEY: Well, as you know, there has been
opposition to that since it expired within Congress, and I think
— I wouldn’t argue with your assessment about that. So the
President is focused on doing the things that we can do that
protect Second Amendment rights, which he thinks is important,
but also to make it harder for individuals who should not, under
existing law, have weapons to obtain them.

QUESTION: Does the President believe that this issue of gun
control should now have sort of a larger role in the campaign? It
hasn’t really been talked about much before this.

MS. PSAKI: I think this stage where this is so fresh and new
for so many people, including the people in Colorado, who are
still mourning the loss of their loved ones, will be for a long
time, many people are still recovering, we're still learning what
exactly happened here and more details -- that's where our focus
is right now. And so it's really too early to say how this will
play. And again, we're just taking it day by day. That's what our
focus is today.

But despite the liberal outcry, Obama's silence on gun control
shouldn't be surprising, despite the tragedy in Aurora. The Obama
administration has been almost totally silent on gun control for
the past three years, even in the aftermath of the Tucson
shooting of then-Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.

The issue is a political loser for the President, who can
ill-afford to open up a third campaign front against the powerful
— and well-funded — NRA lobby going into the 2012 fall campaign.
So however strong the pressure from the left might be to address
gun control in the coming weeks, the pressure to maintain the
status quo will always be a lot a stronger.